Genealogy Chat

Hi Everyone Please could someone tell me who I contact to get a copy of my grandmother's birth certificate. According to the GRO index it is the Ormskirk District but having looked on FreeBMD I think it is North Meols but I am not sure. Is there a register office in North Meols or do I apply to the Lancashire RO in Preston? This is the first English certificate I have tried applying for at a local register office which from the messages on this board is recommended. I am in Scotland so do not know that area of the country. Many thanks Diana

Diana, You would apply to Preston. Barbara.

Hi Barbara Thank you for replying to my post. Please could you tell me do I state the district as North Meols or Ormskirk? I thought North Meols was a sub district of Ormskirk so do I say Ormskirk or narrow it down to North Meols? Many thanks Diana

I would think it best to use the main district which would be Ormskirk. To be honest I find ordering from the GRO the easiest. It might take a few days longer to arrive but you can do it online without too much fuss. Some register offices won't issue certificates for family history purposes (although they are mainly the London offices). I hope you are not expecting English certificates to be as detailed as Scottish ones - otherwise you will be disappointed!! Kath. x

If the marriage (sorry, birth) has been transcribed from the local register office (and over 2m have in Lancashire), it might be easiest to order it online from the Lanc BMD site. I think they pre-populate the order form with the details once you have located the birth you want. Which birth are you looking for? (The site is www.lancashirebmd.org.uk)

Hi Kathleen Thank you for sorting that out for me. I want to give it a go using a local register office. To be honest I have only used GRO before and it was fine. Surely it should have the same information as the Scottish ones? I was presuming so anyway. I find the English system so much more confusing than in Scotland but that is probably because I am not used to it. I haven't got many English certificates as they seem so expensive compared to Scotlandspeople and I live quite near to Edinburgh so go about 3 times a year and pick up certificates for 50p a time which is great. Thank you for answering my post Diana

Hi Ivy I have been on Lancashire BMD and could not find my grandmother's birth. I don't think it has been transcribed yet. Thank you for the advice anyway - it all helps hearing other ideas. I have been going round in circles with this one for a while because I don't know the area and am still quite new at this Many thanks Diana

Register offices are confusing - they kept changing their area and merging, with the records being moved from one to another. Genuki have usefully traced all these changes - see their page: www.genuki.org.uk/big/eng/CivilRegistration.html - see fourth bullet point 'an alternative.....'

Diana, English birth certificates show:- name of child sex date of birth where born name of father name of mother mother's maiden name address ?occupation of father .......and i think that is it!

noting for later thanks

Hi Ivy and Sylvia Thank you both for the information. I shall have a look at Genuki - I did get directed there by FreeBMD( if I remember correctly!) but found it all a bit confusing. Looking at a birth certificate I have for a Scottish birth in the 1870's the information on it seems very similar. I have adapted a letter that someone put on here as a standard so I shall post it tonight and see what happens. Many thanks again everyone Diana